Dr. Kathleen Brady

Sometimes you just need someone from an entirely different field with a different perspective to come up with a disruptive, yet brilliant idea.

A prominent leader in the substance abuse field at a national and international level, Brady is well known for her research in the areas of drug and alcohol dependence, post-traumatic stress disorder and medication development. Brady’s research has been influential in advancing the treatment of addictive disorders in the discovery and development of new psychotherapeutic and pharmacotherapeutic approaches.

She’s been especially interested in exploring how mood and anxiety disorders, as well as victimization and post-traumatic stress disorder, interact with addictive disorders. Another passion is gender-specific research given the high rates of anxiety and mood disorders in women with substance use issues.

“It’s an extraordinary common problem in the U.S. today, and it’s a very underserved population. In that sense, it’s very gratifying to work with this population because we can make some large contributions.”

Brady won the Betty Ford Award for contributions to the treatment of addictions in women in 2001 and was named as the South Carolina Women of Achievement in that same year. She has been continuously federally funded to conduct research since 1989. Another key role she plays is overseeing the NIH-funded Clinical Translational Science Award (CTSA) at MUSC. This is part of a national network supporting research infrastructure and the MUSC CTSA, known as the South Carolina Clinical and Translational Research Institute (SCTR), that facilitates research across the campus as well as incorporate statewide initiatives.

“I’m very interested in bringing people who have different perspectives on a problem together so that they can collectively develop innovative solutions that would be hard for any one person to come up with on their own. Sometimes you just need someone from an entirely different field with a different perspective to come up with a disruptive, yet brilliant idea.”